


From Deep Water

by Rina_san28



Series: Overwatch Fluff Fest [6]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Relationship, F/F, F/M, Families of Choice, Family Fluff, I promise, M/M, Medical Inaccuracies, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Brainwashing, Past Character Death, Recovery, Rescue, Team as Family, look i did my best
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-05
Updated: 2019-06-05
Packaged: 2020-04-08 05:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19100647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rina_san28/pseuds/Rina_san28
Summary: Gabriel Reyes is alive. That much is indisputable fact. What is disputable is what to do about it.---Gabriel Reyes is alive. That much he's figured out. What he hasn't figured out is how to stay that way.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is, folks, the Big Event! I will likely add more onto this series, but this kind of completes the main storyline. Anything after this will be more like bonus material or appendices. 
> 
> This takes place approximately a month after the events of TL;TF and In the Hereafter in this verse and shortly after the end of the Searching comic in canon. 
> 
> Enjoy!

“Good morning, everyone!” Winston sounded far too cheerful for nine o’clock on a Monday morning, Jack thought, but then again, the gorilla was young and he was…not. “Welcome back. Now that the new year is in, everyone’s settled, and Mrs. and Mrs. Oxton are back from their honeymoon, it’s time to get back to work. Before we get into that, however, we need to do a bit of housekeeping.”

 

Jack paid Winston a little less than half a mind, instead taking note of the others at the table. Ana sat to his left, with Sam, Fareeha, and Angela on her other side, all four looking annoyingly awake. Across from him was Jesse, uncharacteristically hat- and serape-free. He was leaned back in his chair, looking relaxed, but present with his broad forearms crossed over his chest. Hanzo, Genji, and Zenyatta were lined up on his right, with the elder Shimada and the omnic taking turns poking the base’s resident cyborg awake. Lena and Emily had taken the far end of the table, not opposite Winston, but far enough away that he could comfortably pretend they weren’t flirting though the whole meeting. Lúcio, Hana, Brigitte, Torbjörn, Reinhardt, Mei – dozens of faces, old and new, but some were still present in their absence.

 

As much as he pretended it was coincidence, everyone knew that the empty seat to his right belonged to Gabriel.

 

“-and I would also like to formally introduce our newest member, Aleksandra Zaryanova,” Winston was saying. “Up until recently, she was a soldier in the Russian Defense Forces, but has now offered us her services. Welcome, Ms. Zaryanova! Overwatch is happy to have you on board!”

 

The woman to his left, tall and muscular with a shock of pink hair, nodded in greeting. “I am happy to serve alongside you all.”

 

“We’re starting for real now,” Winston said, adjusting his glasses, “so Emily and Lena need to stop making eyes at each other and listen. All we need is an hour. I’m begging you.” Emily at least had the decency to look embarrassed, whereas Lena offered up a friendly flip of the bird. “Great. Now, Ms. Zaryanova actually has our first order of business, so if you will?”

 

Her information was unexpected, to say the least. “So, if I’m hearing this right,” Sojourn said, “Volskaya Industries is making and upholding business deals with the Russian omniums.”

 

“That is correct,” Zaryanova said. “She purchases their materials and weaponry plans, and in return they allow her to suggest or prohibit settlements they attack.” If he hadn’t been watching her so closely, Jack might not have noticed the slight quiver of her lip. _She’s lost something._

 

Sojourn, always on his wavelength, pursued the statement. “What brought you to us, Agent Zaryanova? Based on our intelligence, you did not directly answer to Chairman Volskaya.”

 

“I was requested by her for a mission,” Zaryanova explained. “I was to investigate the woman who had infiltrated the compound and threatened her. However, she lied to me about the encounter. I found the woman and she told me the truth, which Volskaya confirmed. When I returned to the front, I found many casualties in my unit and my village destroyed once again.” She swallowed. “To defeat the omnics, Volskaya Industries must be dealt with.”

 

“I understand,” Sojourn said softly, “and I am very sorry for your losses. Please be seated.” Zaryanova nodded shortly, then retook her seat.

 

A comment popped up from an unexpected corner. “This gal you met,” Jesse said, leaning forward, “did she happen to be purple?”

 

Zaryanova blinked. “She was.”

 

“Ah, good ol’ Sombra.” He smiled. “She takes some getting’ used to, and she tends to lack social awareness, but she means well. Just doesn’t take the path of the righteous, so to speak.”

 

“You know her?” Winston asked.

 

“We’re pals. Give each other a helpin’ hand every once in a while.” He exchanged a look with Hanzo. “On that note, Winston, would’ja mind if I wiggled around the agenda a bit?”

 

The room went still, and Jack suddenly had the feeling that there was a conversation going on that he wasn’t privy to. A glance at Ana showed she felt the same.

 

Winston cleared his throat. “Of course, Jesse. Go ahead.”

 

Jesse stood and strolled to the computer, control settling across his shoulders like a cape. “There’re several people here that didn’t attend the last few meetin’s due to, well, not bein’ here, but we’ve got some real pretty pieces of intel.” He flicked a small data drive out of a compartment in his left arm. “Before we get into the meat of it, though, I’ve got a brain or two I’d like to pick.” Apology written on his face, he looked up and met Jack’s eyes. “Dad, I’d like to ask you a few questions about the Soldier Enhancement Program.”

 

Jack blew out a long breath, leaning back in his seat. “That was a long time ago,” he said finally, “but I’ll try my best. What’ve you got?”

 

His son reached over the monitor to accept a small stack of papers from Hanzo. “These here,” he said to the room at large, “are excerpts from unofficial mission reports, or as Han likes to call ‘em, my diary. I recorded every conversation I had on missions and every single thing that happened, even if it wasn’t goin’ in the official report. One thing that Gabriel Reyes, my commander and other dad, and I used to talk about was what he’d gone through to get to where he was. What really got me thinkin’ was what he said about SEP.” He pulled a page out at random. _“Jefe told me the mid-round physicals were the worst,”_ he read. _“They had to stay awake from forty-eight to seventy-two hours before the appointment, where they would then have to do several different types of physical exercise, multiple medical tests, and have so much blood drawn that he said it felt like you didn’t have a drop left.”_

 

“That’s true,” Jack said. “Your performance determined if you would go on to the next round treatments, repeat the previous round, or be discharged from the program. Gabriel came close to repeating a few in the beginning, but neither of us ever had to do it.”

 

Jesse selected another page. _“Dad was down with a migraine today, so Pops and I did the new recruit inspections. ‘This is a walk in the park compared to the ones he got during SEP,’ Papa told me. ‘There was one so bad that he couldn’t keep any food down for almost a week.’”_

 

“That is also true,” Jack said, and he did his best to ignore Angela’s eyes burning into the back of his skull. “It was a side effect of one of the treatments, I think it was the eyesight one.”

 

“This one interested me the most, though,” Jesse said. Instead of reading the paper, he slid it across the table to Jack. “You wanna talk about it?”

 

He didn’t need to look down to know what it was. “Gabe told me you talked about it. I was happy he’d told you about it instead of me.” He rubbed the ghost of his wedding band. “I proposed to Gabriel after the ninth round of injections,” he said. “It was a rough one even for those who’d been doing okay. He wasn’t one of the lucky ones. I sat by his bedside every single day for almost three weeks, praying endlessly that he’d live. In one of the rare moments that he was conscious, I told him that if he made it through, I’d marry him on the spot, which was kinda ambitious considering that we weren’t a couple yet. He finally got an all-clear from the doctors just in time for leave. Met me in the barracks with a wedding set.”

 

“Do you know what the injections were for?” Angela asked.

 

“From what I could gather, it was stuff about cell composition and regrowth rate. The serious stuff for that didn’t come until round twenty, but round six was meant to get things started, I guess.”

 

“That’s a damn good guess,” Jesse said. “In fact, it’s right on the money. Y’see, just before the recall message went out, Hanzo, Genji, Zenyatta ‘n I enlisted the help of the Sombra Collective – the lady in purple – to retrieve Gabriel Reyes’s medical files. She did us one better and got Jack Morrison’s too for no additional fee. Angie was kind enough to look ‘em over for us.”

 

Angela took the cue. “The chemical cocktail used was extremely volatile. Based on my own data simulation trials, poor application or reception had the potential to lead to cellular destabilization on a genetic level, manifesting the development of necrotic tissues on living people. Seeing as Gabriel fell into the second of the two negative possibilities, it is highly likely that his condition caused him to react negatively to my nanites after Geneva.”

 

Jack’s throat went dry. “What do you mean ‘after Geneva’?” he asked.

 

“I was in the city of Geneva for personal business when the base blew,” she said. “I joined the rest of the first responders and happened to be the one to find him. Somehow, he was still alive, but when I attempted to help him, he…dissolved.”

 

“…Yeah, that sounds about right,” Jack sighed. “I knew something was up with him, but he did a real good job of hiding that it was medical. I didn’t know until the day it happened. If I’d figured it out earlier, maybe he wouldn’t have-” _turned into a smoking wraith and puppet of a terrorist organization_ “-had to do what he did.”

 

“Which was hirin’ Moira O’Deorain,” Jesse said.

 

“Yeah. Hiring O’Deorain.” He laughed, the sound bitter and cold. “He was my husband. You’d think I’d know him better than a power-hungry, manipulative scientist, but there you go.”

 

“That is not your fault, Jack,” Ana scolded, though the argument was tired. “Gabriel made his own choices. While that still doesn’t make what happened to him his fault, it certainly doesn’t make it yours.”

 

“What happened to him is…kinda the thing, though.” Jesse coughed uncomfortably. “I got a tip a little over a year ago that sent me off on a chase. I got the data, got caught, and got rescued by this crew over here-” Genji and Zenyatta gave identical, cheeky salutes while Hanzo simply sighed, “-who helped me piece together the rest.” He hesitated. “Dad…he’s alive. Papa’s alive.”

 

With the eyes of the entire room on him, he couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

 

“Dad?” Lena asked. “Are you okay?” Ana broke down then as well, little hissing giggles that couldn’t be contained. “Mum?”

 

“I know he is, Jess,” Jack finally got out. “I’ve known for…three years now? Ana and I have been trying to hunt him down and bring him back, but we’ve been fresh outta luck recently. Probably because of you kids.”

 

Jesse stared at him, dumbfounded. “You knew? Why didn’t you tell me?”

 

“Why didn’t _you_ tell _me?”_ Jack pointed out. He went over and placed a hand on his son’s shoulder. “I didn’t want to have to be the one to tell you that Gabe was Talon’s pet mercenary because I knew it would break your heart.”

 

“Same reasons,” Jesse said. He grinned, bright and relieved, and clasped Jack’s shoulder in return. “Well, now that’s outta the way, looks like we’ve got some work to do. Unless anyone else has world-breaking revelations?”

 

Ana raised her hand. “Widowmaker is Amélie Lacroix.”

 

“What?”

 

\-----

 

Discussion eventually moved to planning, and that required information. Jack, Ana, Jesse, Angela, Genji, and anyone else who’d had the slightest interaction with either Gabriel or Amélie Lacroix volunteered what they could as they developed different scenarios. Taking on a whole Talon compound was nixed immediately. They considered using someone as bait, sending in an undercover agent to investigate, capturing an underling for further intel, even outright contacting Gabriel directly, but nothing seemed to click.

 

Finally, Hanzo snapped. “What we need is the last piece of conscious interaction Reaper had as Gabriel Reyes,” he said. “The only person who knows that information, however, is Gabriel Reyes, which leaves us at a dead end.”

 

Jack swallowed. “I know that information.” The eyes of the entire room swiveled to him, and he looked squarely at the table to avoid their stares. “I was the last person he talked to.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell us sooner?” Ana asked, gentle but steady in the way of a mother.

 

“I don’t like to think about it,” he said. He glanced up at her briefly, but was unable to hold her gaze. “I’m sure you understand.”

 

“Of course we understand,” Winston said. “It was an incredibly traumatic experience in many ways. However, we do need to know.”

 

He shook his head. “I can’t-”

 

Zenyatta materialized at his side, and a harmony orb floated up to rest above Jack’s head. “We all sympathize greatly with you, Jack,” the monk said, “and we will give you all of the space you need to process this meeting at its conclusion. However, you hold vital information regarding the topic. I do not say this to guilt-trip you; I speak only the truth as I understand it.” He took his hand. “This is not a burden you must carry alone. Let us share it.”

 

Jack glanced up at him, then looked over at Jesse. The cowboy was pale, his hair mussed, and the crow’s feet and worry lines marking his prematurely-aged face were stark in the cold light of the meeting room. Jesse met his gaze, and in the silence, agreed.

 

“I’ve never forgotten a moment of it,” he whispered. Ana gave his knee a subtle squeeze under the table, and he released Zenyatta to clutch her hand like a lifeline. “Do you really want to know?”

 

Winston locked eyes with him across the table. “Jack,” he said, soft, but firm, “tell us. What really happened in Geneva?”

 

\-----

 

**April 17 th, 2070**

**Watchpoint: Geneva**

 

_(“…Everything was normal, I guess. Just a run-of-the-mill day. I had about an hour left before a meeting with some of the training staff, so I was sitting at my desk and looking over some reports.”)_

 

The door slammed open.

 

“Gabriel?” Jack stood as his husband nearly sprinted in. “I thought you wouldn’t be back until Thursday!”

 

“Plans changed,” Gabriel said shortly. “Athena! Do a full bug sweep and deactivation of this office. I want every frequency and material on the goddamn planet run, you hear me?”

 

“Right away, Commander Reyes.”

 

_(“He was frantic. It was…so unlike him. He had a public persona, sure, that’s not news to any of you, but even in private I had never seen him so upset.”)_

 

“Gabe, what’s going on?” Jack asked. He reached out for him, but Gabriel stepped back.

 

“No, please don’t touch me,” he begged, “Jackie, we’re out of time.”

 

“What do you mean we’re out of time?”

 

“We weren’t quick enough, how could I be so stupid – baby, I’m sorry-”

 

Jack took a step towards him, reaching out again, only for Gabriel to make another retreat. “Honey, you’re scaring me-”

 

_(“Whenever Athena does a bug sweep, she tells you how many she got.”)_

 

“One hundred thirty-seven bugs located and deactivated, Commanders.”

 

_(“I had never heard such a high number in one sweep.”)_

 

“I swept yesterday!” Jack protested.

 

“Doesn’t matter,” Gabriel said, “they’ll get ‘em in here.”

 

“Who will, Gabe?” Jack asked, trying a third time to reach his husband.

 

Gabriel ripped off his beanie and tossed it to the floor. “We’ve been betrayed!” he yelled. “Seventy-two percent of my remaining Blackwatch agents are Talon. _Seventy-two percent!_ And Blackwatch isn’t the only hub – you’ve got a lot, too.”

 

“How can you be sure?”

 

“Petras is prepping a motion right now to shut us down for good,” Gabriel continued, ignoring him completely. “He’s been paid off for a while now, about fifteen years-”

 

_(“I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He was spilling all of this information, literally almost a decade’s worth of Overwatch decay, as if he could die in the next breath. No matter what I did, though, he still wouldn’t let me touch him.”)_

 

“Gabriel!” Jack yelled, breaking off the other man’s increasingly disjointed report. “Are. You. Sure.”

 

“Yes!” Gabriel nearly sobbed his answer. “Jackie, I’m so sorry, I don’t have enough _time-_ ”

 

“What do you need, sweetheart?” Jack asked. He reached out one final time, and successfully caught his hand, feeling the cold metal of Gabriel’s wedding ring against his fingers. “What can I do?”

 

“We need to get out,” he said immediately. “Get out ASAP, leave everything behind.”

 

“I can’t just do that,” Jack said, but Gabriel shook his head.

 

“Listen to me! You don’t have time!”

 

_(“He finally seemed to notice that I was holding his hand, and I swear to God that he almost screamed. He yanked away from me, and when I looked down, my hand and coat were covered in blood.”)_

 

“Gabe! Your hand!” Jack tried to get a closer look, but Gabriel tucked it away. “Please, babe, let me see-”

 

Gabriel was sobbing in earnest. “I need Angie!”

 

“She’s gone,” Jack said, “she resigned four months ago-”

 

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you-”

 

“Didn’t tell me wha-”

 

_(“The whole building shook. Gabriel looked at me, and his pupils were so blown that I could barely see the green in his eyes.”)_

 

Gabriel reached up with his bloody hand and cupped Jack’s cheek, all tenderness and care. “ _Mi amor,_ I wish we-”

 

_Boom!_

_(“And then everything turned into a fiery hellscape.”)_

 

\-----

 

“I still don’t fully understand,” Jack admitted, “and I’ve been thinking about it for a long time. You’re right. The only way I can get the real answers is if we can save Gabriel from Talon and bring him home.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Writing Notes:**
> 
>  
> 
> 1) If you've read the rest of this series, you'll have noticed that I use first names for everybody. This is to reinforce the family aspect of the team; my mother doesn't call me by my last name, she calls me by my _name_. Zarya - Aleksandra, or "Aleks", as she's called later in the fic - will get to that point as well.  
> 2) As I said in Of Belonging, I strongly headcanon that Jesse and Sombra are friends. Additionally, based on the official comic Searching, I believe that Sombra is firmly a friend of the Good Side, howevermuch she likes to play on the Bad Side.  
> 3) Jack has been back for a short time, but while Ana went away for the holidays, he stayed on base and got to know his kids again (and adopted some new ones).  
> 4) There is some good old theatrical tension here. You, the audience, know based on canon events that Jack and Ana know about Gabriel. You also know that, based on Of Belonging (assuming you've read it), Jesse and the rest of Overwatch also know about Gabriel. However, the two parties don't know that fact about each other. It's very simple and resolved quickly, but I was very pleased with myself for that one.  
> 5) Everything about SEP is invented. The bit about Jack and Gabriel getting married after a rough round of SEP Stuff is something I read in a slew of fics ages ago and really liked.  
> 6) All medical stuff is also invented. I am not, and will never be, a medical professional of any kind.  
> 7) Ana is one of the few people privy to that tidbit about Widowmaker. This pleases her.  
> 8) I wrote the Geneva sequence before I wrote the actual fic. It almost didn't make the cut, but my sister, who does most of my proofreading, insisted I put it in, so I rewrote part of the chapter to fit it. I genuinely believe it is one of, if not the best tension sequences I have ever written.  
> 9) Jack has never, _ever_ told anybody what happened in Geneva. This is a huge gesture of recovery, trust, and faith on his part. 
> 
> The fic is almost completely done - only a few pages left to go - and will be completely posted by the end of the week. See you soon!


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome to Chapter 2! 
> 
> We're going a little bit back in time for this chapter. This actually starts before the Old Soldiers comic in canon and the beginning itself is scattered through Of Belonging. There are timeline cues throughout, though, so y'all should be fine. 
> 
> Enjoy!

The first time Sombra was injured on a mission, Reaper didn’t understand why he was so frightened. While it was serious, it certainly wasn’t life-threatening, but something in him made him stick close, made him push the Talon foot soldiers away and carry her to the ship himself.

 

When he got there, Widowmaker was waiting, and as he watched the two women sit entwined together, his chest felt tight. For the life of him, he couldn’t figure out why.

 

\-----

 

The first time Widowmaker smiled instead of smirking, Reaper didn’t understand why he felt so…pleased. He was completely indifferent to whether or not the assassin did anything. It wasn’t in his mission brief, and Widowmaker was not his responsibility.

 

\-----

 

 _“Amélie!”_ Sombra screamed, sprinting to Widowmaker’s side as she fell. The frantic Spanish prayers washed over him as he tried to quell his own feeling of panic. He didn’t panic, Reaper told himself, he was dead and dead people don’t feel things. But still he joined her, and when he found himself praying alongside her, he didn’t question how he knew the words.

 

\-----

 

Widowmaker had been acting strangely. It has started with the smile, just a small one when Sombra made a bad joke over the comm. Then she bought a sundress. In June, he saw her walking down the hall with a bouquet of sunflowers. He could hear her laugh now through the shared wall of their quarters, as well as the sweet sound of piano music, each piece repeated with a frequency that told him she was dancing to it.

 

(How did he know she was dancing? He’d never seen her do it, and he knew next to nothing about her life before Talon had made them mission partners. Still, the certainty was there, and he felt a sensation he diagnosed as relief.)

 

Reaper had a routine. Every morning at seven o’clock sharp, he would eat one of the protein packs O’Deorain provided. Once it was empty, he would check for mission-related summons before going to the shooting range until half-nine and the gym until noon, when he would return to his quarters for another protein pack. The afternoon was spent doing other training involving his nanites, followed by a third protein pack at five and not leaving again until the next morning.

 

Sombra didn’t seem to care much for routine.

 

One day, the room next door was unusually quiet. It was the same the next day, and the next, and the next, until he saw Widowmaker, alone, in the hallway. She nodded at him in greeting, and he paused as he realized the issue. “Where’s Sombra?”

 

“She is in the U.S.” She shrugged nonchalantly. “Personal business. You know how she is.”

 

Reaper’s hand smoked out briefly. “Come to my quarters,” he said. “Bring some food. You don’t have to be alone every day.”

 

“I could say the same to you,” Widowmaker replied, but she followed his suggestion.

 

When she knocked on his door the next evening, enough dinner in hand for two, he let her in without a word and left the protein pack on the shelf.

 

\-----

 

Sombra returned at the end of the next week, and Reaper found that he was…sad. Surely the evenings he was having with Widowmaker would stop now that her partner – and they were _definitely_ partners – had come home, and he would go back to his usual pattern of eating, training, and not sleeping until a mission came around. But it didn’t happen. The first day, five o’clock sharp, Widowmaker strolled in with a meal for three under one arm and Sombra under the other.

 

It was…fun. Widowmaker always liked to say that the only joy she got was from a kill, a feeling he shared, but sitting there with them, he found himself chuckling almost against his will. Sombra was _funny_. Widowmaker played the deadpan straight-man like the part was made for her. Neither of them questioned him when he ate with his back to them or refused to remove his mask. The food disappeared, but the company didn’t, and before he knew it, it was nearing midnight.

 

Widowmaker was stretched out on his sofa, her feet hanging off the end, and Sombra had draped herself on top of her like a human blanket. She’d pulled an old telenovela up on her screens for them to watch. It’d been a long time since Reaper had watched anything other than mission or training material, and the change was refreshing. In the silence between episodes, the hacker did what she did best: confused him.

 

“Can I call you ‘Gabe’?” she asked.

 

Reaper blinked. “Why?”

 

“Because it’s your name.” She gave him an indecipherable look. “Don’t you know your name?”

 

“I was called Gabriel Reyes,” he said, “but he’d dead.” The two women exchanged a glance and he frowned. “Hey, neither of you have names.”

 

“Yes, we do,” Widowmaker said. “You didn’t ask.” Despite her nonchalance, she seemed concerned.

 

“My name’s Olivia Colomar,” Sombra said. “There, a name for a name, Gabe.”

 

He knew when to pick his battles. “Fine, _Olivia._ ”

 

“You may use mine as well,” Widowmaker said. “It’s Amélie Lacroix.”

 

“Lacroix?” he asked. For some reason, he felt as though he’d been doused with ice water. _He’s dead, Jackie, and she’s gone, I failed them both-_

 

“Gabriel?”

 

He blinked and found that his legs were gone, dissolved into smoky clouds. “What?”

 

“Are you alright?” Widow – _Amélie_ – studied him, but seemed unsurprised.

 

“I’m fine,” he lied, “that just happens sometimes.”

 

“If you say so,” Sombra said. “Mind if we crash on your sofa? I’m too lazy to walk back to my room.”

 

“You could just go to Amélie’s room,” he said, “it’s right next door, and you spend enough time there anyway.”

 

“How did you know?” she asked.

 

He smirked, even though they couldn’t see it. “The walls are thin.” Both women reddened and he waved a hand at them as he strolled back to his bedroom. “You can stay, but don’t fuck on my couch.”

 

“You are worse than a dad, Gabriel Reyes!” Olivia yelled, shaking her fist cartoonishly. “You are a grumpy old man!”

 

“Use protection!”

 

_“¡Vete a la mierda!”_

 

\-----

 

Sombra and Widowmaker – _Olivia and Amélie_ – came over every night. Sometimes they would stay the night, sometimes they wouldn’t, but they didn’t push at Gabriel’s past anymore. During the day, Amélie would join him in the shooting range and gym while Olivia would turn up during his afternoon practices, and neither of them called him _Reaper_ anymore. They grew closer and more cohesive, and their performance during the next mission they took earned rare praise from Ogundimu.

 

October rolled around and Olivia enlisted his help in preparing a meal for the three of them. “It’s _Día de los Muertos_ ,” she said, “don’t you remember?”

 

He stared down at the seeds she’d shoved into his hands and wondered if he’d known in the first place. _Come here, mijo, put the cup down carefully for abuela-_ “It’s been a while.”

 

She had him grind up the seeds and some cinnamon sticks (“Fresh ingredients are best,” she instructed, covering the counter in flour), and then together they made the ring of ingredients. Olivia grabbed a stool for leverage and began kneading the ring into dough. Somewhat awkwardly, Gabriel stood by and watched.

 

She glanced up at him. “Are you going to help?” He held up his gloved hands. “Take them off, then.”

 

“It’s not my gloves, it’s-” He released a sharp breath of frustration. “I don’t think you want me to take them off.”

 

“I’ve seen a lot, Gabe, I can handle your old man hands.”

 

Slowly, uncertainly, he tugged them off, probably for the first time it…he didn’t want to think about it. He grimaced at the grey and flaking skin below, his tissues dying and regenerating, constantly on fire in a way he couldn’t quench-

 

His train of thought was broken when something his him square in the chest. On reflex, he caught it, and looked down to see a pair of clear plastic gloves.

 

“Put those on and get over here,” Sombra said, pointing to their second set of ingredients. “We’ve got more bread to make.”

 

Gabriel paused, smiled, and did as he was bid.

 

\-----

 

The days wore on. Gabriel was assigned a solo mission to Egypt. He was being hunted by two separate vigilantes, and with both of them in Cairo, it was too good of an opportunity to pass up.

 

He didn’t expect the memories.

 

In his rage and confusion, he shot Soldier: 76, he attacked Shrike. He knew their names, he realized, and moments from when he really had been _Gabriel Reyes_ popped up unbidden. “I know your every move before you even make it,” he told Jack Morrison. “Always have. Always will.” _That used to be reassuring,_ something in his mind told him. He ignored it, drawing off the parts of him that he did remember, the arguments and the pain and the betrayal and ignoring the memories of warm hands and sweet kisses and long nights under the sheets pretending the world was only them-

 

Ana Amari caught him off-guard. _She always does_ , his mind supplied, and he squashed the thought like a bug. She tackled him to the ground, ripped off his mask, and her remaining eye widened in horror. “What happened to you?”

 

“They left you to die,” he said, taking advantage of her shock to smoke away. “They left me to suffer. Never forget that.”

 

He hid in a tree, still wraithed, and watched the two walk away from the compound. The sight was bittersweet, somehow, and he was hit with a wave of grief.

 

The council praised him for uncovering the identity of Shrike and wounding Soldier: 76. He took it in silence, as he always did, submitted to an examination from O’Deorain, as he always did, and returned to his quarters.

 

Amélie and Olivia were waiting for him, and he suddenly realized that he hadn’t replaced his mask. What could they be thinking, staring at his burning eyes, the gaping hole in his cheek, the ruin of his nose? How could they stand there and take in what had horrified a woman who apparently had once been his closest friend? He turned to leave.

 

“Gabriel,” Amélie called, her voice gentle. A delicate hand landed on his shoulder and pulled him around to face her. He went without resistance.

 

“Sorry,” he muttered. “It was broken.”

 

She ran her thumb over his exposed cheekbone. “Your appearance doesn’t matter to us, _mon ami._ We are all a little broken here.”

 

For the first time in years, he felt like crying. He glanced between the two women as his breathing became rough and frantic. “What is happening to me?” he asked, desperate for answers.

 

“You’re becoming _you_ again,” Amélie said. “It’s okay. We can help you.”

 

“We’ll explain everything,” Olivia promised, stretching up to pat his greying curls. “Don’t worry about it, _Papí._ ” They dragged him to the couch, sandwiching him between them, and they didn’t move until morning.

 

\-----

 

Olivia began the process the next evening. “They placed a block on your memories,” she explained, setting up her equipment on the coffee table, “but yours isn’t as thorough as Amélie’s was. Hers took _ages_ to fix. They must’ve wanted you to only have certain memories instead of a clean wipe.”

 

“You haven’t looked at mine, though,” Gabriel said.

 

“I checked it months ago,” she said with a dismissive handwave. “I even unlocked a little bit of it. That’s probably why this mission got you so bad. Sorry about that.”

 

Amélie had explained, slowly and with great hesitation, how she ended up with Talon. It was not a happy story, but for the first time, he was able to connect dots and figure how he fit. _(“Gérard met you at a charity dinner,” he remembered. “He was so nervous about making a good first impression, but you just strolled over and asked if you could get him a drink.” She dropped her head into her hands and for a moment he wondered if he’d made her cry, but when she’d lifted her face again, she was grinning.)_ The two women had assured him that Olivia not only knew what she needed to do, but it was the best time to do it since O’Deorain would be gone for the next several months at a conference.

 

“You will probably have a headache when she’s done,” Amélie warned.

 

“I’ve been in constant pain for years,” he retorted. “This’ll be nothing.”

 

“Are you ready?” Olivia asked, pulling up her screens.

 

He nodded sharply. “Go for it.”

 

It was odd, he thought, having someone rummage around in your head. He could _feel_ her unhooking things, removing things, repairing things. The world got clearer, somehow, less…fuzzy. He told her so.

 

“Amélie said the same,” she said, typing a long string of code into a menu. “They altered what are basically your perception filters. I might be able to take the red away from your eyes, if you’d like.”

 

“That would be great.”

 

The process continued. Olivia followed through on the eyes, and also returned the sensation of touch to his hands. Amélie handed him a ball of yarn to test it and he nearly wept at the softness. “Eat this,” the Frenchwoman said, tossing a piece of chocolate at him, and for the first time in years he could taste _everything_.

 

Finally, Olivia opened a secondary screen. “This is the big guy,” she said. “You’re likely going to receive a memory rush. If you do pass out, it’s okay, so don’t try and fight it; you might do more harm than good, understand?”

 

He nodded.

 

“The effects may last several days,” she continued, “but we’ll stay here and monitor you. You won’t be alone, _Papí,_ I promise. On the count of three. _Uno-” I’ll be me again._ _“-dos-”_ _I’ll see them again._ _“-tres.”_

 

_I’ll see him again._

There was a rush of color and a blast of pain. Distantly, he heard screaming, but just as he registered it was him, the world went black.

 

\-----

 

Gabriel came to in his bedroom. It was dark and quiet, a blessing for the ceaseless pounding of his skull. Hesitantly, he tried to push himself upright, but was stopped by something on top of him. A glance down showed it to be Olivia, sprawled across the bed like a starfish except for the arm around his waist and her head over his heart.

 

The door cracked open and Amélie stuck her head in. “You’re awake.”

 

He was hit with a sudden wave of emotion, unrestricted for the first time…probably since Geneva, he supposed. In the lines of Amélie’s face, he could see the sweet and whip smart dancer that had won Gérard’s affections and realized fully what had been done to her. “Amie, I’m so sorry,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “Kiddo, I’m so fucking sorry, we should’ve looked harder, I-”

 

Amélie swept across the room silently, taking his broad hand in both of her thin ones. “Hush now,” she said. “You have had quite the ordeal. You need rest.”

 

“I could have saved you!” Gabriel said desperately. “I could have saved both of you! How do you live like this, _mija?”_

 

“I had no choice,” she said. “Neither did you.”

 

“It was my own stupidity that landed me here, you did nothing wrong.”

 

“Your hands were tied.”

 

“That’s not-”

 

“Besides,” Amélie said, the smile on her face tinted with sadness, “if I was still at home with Gérard in Paris, who would be here to pull your head out of your ass?”

 

He paused. “You miss him still?”

 

Her answer was instant. “Every day,” she said. She looked down at her sleeping partner, and her eyes went soft. “Olivia understands. She found our wedding photo and gave it to me as a gift. I like to think he would have loved her as much as I do.”

 

“They would’ve gotten on like a house on fire,” he chuckled, doing his best not to wake her. “Overwatch would’ve been their kingdom within the hour.”

 

Amélie hummed in amused agreement. “Perhaps it is for the best that they never met.”

 

The pair sat in silence, each taking and accepting comfort. Olivia shifted in her sleep, letting out a tiny sigh and nuzzling into Gabriel’s chest. Hesitantly, he ran a hand through her hair. “How long’s she been here?”

 

“She hasn’t left your side since you collapsed,” Amélie said. “I told her I’d wake her as soon as you woke up, but obviously that was a lie. She’s barely slept at all.”

 

He frowned. “How long was I out?”

 

“Nearly four days,” she said. “Olivia hacked you on Friday evening. Today is Wednesday, four-thirty AM.”

 

“Oops.”

 

“‘Oops’ is right,” Amélie teased. She roughened her voice and hunched her shoulders in a poor impression of him. “‘I’ve been in constant pain for years, this’ll be nothing-’”

 

“Oh, shut it.”

 

Their banter was enough to rouse the hacker. Her breath caught and she shot upright, looking adorable with her sleep-mussed hair and pillow lines. “Gabe! You’re awake!”

 

“And you’ve been awake for too long, I hear,” Gabriel said. For the first time since he woke, he realized that his voice no longer had its mangled edge. “I’ll be fine, _chica,_ you keep sleeping. I’m not going anywhere.”

 

“But I need to check you over!” she protested, biting back a yawn.

 

“And you can,” he said, “later.” He pulled her back to his chest, then tugged at Amélie’s hand with a raised eyebrow. The Frenchwoman rolled her eyes, but allowed herself to be pulled onto Olivia’s other side. “Everybody’s here now, and no one leaves this bed until nine, understood?”

 

“Loud and clear, _Papí_ ,” Olivia murmured, and with no further prompting, was out like a light.

 

“Thanks, Amie,” Gabe whispered.

 

“Don’t worry about it. Go to sleep.”

 

“I’m already asleep.”

 

“I’m not playing this game. Go to sleep or I’ll knock you unconscious.”

 

“Rude.”

 

“Gabriel Reyes, I swear to god-”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Translations:**  
>  ¡Vete a la mierda! - Fuck off!  
> mijo - son  
> abuela - grandmother  
> mija - my daughter
> 
>  **Writing Notes:**  
>  1) At the start of this story, Sombra/Olivia has already de-programmed Widow/Amélie. Gabriel, however, is still very much programmed despite the cracks beginning to show.  
> 2) I'm going with the pretty much universally-accepted headcanon that Gabriel speaks fluent Spanish, though he hasn't used it as Reaper for anything outside of missions and dealing with Olivia.  
> 3) In case you didn't catch it, Olivia's break in routine is her going to meet with Jesse at the end of Of Belonging.  
> 4) I should note here that Reaper definitely knows that he used to be known as Gabriel Reyes, he was the leader of Blackwatch, and was passed over for Overwatch leadership in favor of Jack Morrison, but it and everything else feels very distant. His memory has been filtered to show only the bits where he had arguments with his team/family, so that's kinda all he's had for the past five to six years.  
> 5) Once a dad, always a dad.  
> 6) Olivia and Gabriel are making pan de muerto, which looks like a very tasty thing that I might have to make sometime.  
> 7) The most common guess at what's going on with Gabe is that his cells are constantly dying and regenerating at a rapid pace. In this fic, this is happening, but it's being forced to continue by Moira - she's killing his cells and keeping him "trapped" as Reaper.  
> 8) Gabriel allows his programming to take over as his actual mind is slipping through the cracks. Olivia and Amélie's plan worked, but they weren't expecting him to be faced with someone from his past this soon.  
> 9) He hasn't let anyone touch him outside of "medical" reasons in years. You could say he's a bit touch-starved.  
> 10) Olivia is _good_ at what she does and Gabriel knows it. He wouldn't have let her near him if he didn't trust her completely.  
> 11) Gérard was one of Gabe's most trusted people back in Overwatch/Blackwatch, so Amélie was also a very close friend and was around the various Watchpoints frequently. 
> 
> See you soon with the next chapter!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, folks! Here's Chapter 3! 
> 
> The beginning of this chapter and TL;TF are happening concurrently, though there is a slight time jump that puts us in line with the first chapter of this fic. Yay timelines! 
> 
> Enjoy!

When it came to escaping, they didn’t really have a plan. Getting out at all was a given; it was the execution that was a mystery, in a _we’ll-burn-that-bridge-when-we-get-to-it_ sort of way. Gabriel trained as normal, went on missions as normal, attended meeting as normal, but every evening he sat in his quarters with his daughters – because that’s what they _were,_ just as much as Jesse and Genji and Lena and all the other young’uns he’d left behind – and tried to piece together a future.

 

“Do you think Jackie’s gonna forgive me?” he asked one day out of the blue. Olivia and Amélie paused their bickering and blinked at him.

 

“Where did that come from?” Olivia asked. “Genuine question. You were, like, totally chill two seconds ago.”

 

“Just covering all my bases.” Gabriel shifted uncomfortably. “The whole thing’s kinda my fault in the first place. I got cocky, got the boys in situations they really shouldn’t have been in, I ended up getting Overwatch under investigation because I couldn’t calm down for even half a second to think things through, I let the media invent a rift between me and Jack, which just made all of the politics harder for him,” he listed, ticking them off on his fingers, “and worst of all, I let my fears get the better of me and trusted Moira, against every single one of Jack’s warnings. How can he trust me now?”

 

Olivia raised an eyebrow. “Do you feel better now that you’ve listed everything you hate about yourself, or do you need another minute to wallow in it?” she asked bluntly. “You were one of the most visible and well-known members of an organization the world worshipped. Their expectations for you were far too high to be realistic. You did your best, but you are human. Well,” she said, “super-human. Like, Captain America levels of human.”

 

“I’m no Brooklyn boy,” Gabriel said, but he didn’t smile. “We were married. Married people are supposed to trust each other.”

 

“Most married people aren’t part of a global paramilitary organization,” Amélie said. “Gérard kept many secrets from me about his work. That did not make him a bad or neglectful husband – he was doing his job. You and Jack were much the same, and telling each other about every aspect of your work would have been a conflict of interest. It is perfectly acceptable given the circumstances.”

 

“Even health?”

 

“You were frightened,” she said. “That is a perfectly understandable exception. If there was something going on with me that could possibly end in my death, I likely wouldn’t tell my spouse at first either. Breaking such news is…difficult.”

 

Gabriel paused. “Amélie,” he said, “is what they did to you killing you?”

 

The two women exchanged another look.

 

“It may be,” Amélie admitted, hesitant, “but there is no way I can know until I see a medic without a Talon agenda.”

 

He nodded, the very beginnings of their escape to-do list forming in his mind. “Then we’re going to have to get you one.”

 

\-----

 

In the end, everything fell together in a sweeping moment of luck.

 

“I’m assigning only you three on this mission for a reason,” Ogundimu told them. “This must not get out to the rest of the organization.”

 

“Maybe if you got the point, we could do something about it,” Olivia said casually, inspecting her fingernails. “We don’t have all day.”

 

The Talon head gave her an exasperated glare. “Maybe if you kept your mouth shut, I could give you the details,” he said testily.

 

“Leave off, Sombra,” Gabriel said, grimacing internally at the artificial grating voice coming from the mask’s vocal distorters. He returned his attention to Ogundimu.” “What do you need?”

 

Professionally as ever, Ogundimu pulled up a rotating hologram of a young man in standard Talon uniform. “This is field medic Jean-Baptiste Augustin, thirty-six years old. He is a dangerous deserter and must be disposed of.”

 

“You must be concerned if you are sending us,” Amélie said, face and voice chillingly void of emotion.

 

“We’ve sent dozens of operatives,” Ogundimu said. “Not a single one has returned.”

 

“We can take him out,” Gabriel said. “Where is he?”

 

“That’s the problem: we don’t know.” A globe appeared next to Augustin’s figure, red dots covering the continents. “We have tips all over the world, but he cannot be in every place at once. Luckily, the Sombra Collective is on our side.”

 

“Transfer me the data and I’ll have him by morning,” Olivia said.

 

“Excellent. These are copies of his file. Read them over, then notify me personally when you are ready and I will have a transport prepared for you.” Ogundimu deactivated the holograms and gave them all a piercing stare. “Do not fail me.”

 

“We never fail,” Amélie said. “This will be no different.”

 

“Good. Dismissed.”

 

The trio rose as one and filed out, walking to Olivia’s room in a tense silence. It felt like the longest walk Gabriel had taken in his life.

 

The moment Olivia finished the bug sweep, Amélie wheeled around to look at him. “This is it,” she gasped, frantic. “This is our chance. We must take it.”

 

“She’s right,” Olivia added, “he’s a medic, it’s only us, no one else knows we’re going. I told him morning, but with this data I’ll have his location in an hour. We’ll have plenty of time to pack and download as much Talon data as we need.”

 

Amélie dropped down onto the sofa. “Please, Gabriel. I can’t do this anymore. We have to get out before O’Deorain gets back or else-”

 

“One question.” Gabriel removed his mask and looked at the pair, eyes soft. “Why are you asking me like I’m going to tell you ‘no’?”

 

“…What?”

 

“You two are extremely intelligent and immensely capable. If you think now is the time, then I trust your judgement.” He plopped onto the sofa next to Amélie, slinging a comforting arm around her shoulders. “Honestly, I was going to say the same thing and thought you’d call me an idiot for it.”

 

“We’ll have to somehow indicate that we aren’t a threat,” Olivia said as she transferred the data to her network. “The usual weapons-down approach won’t work as he likely knows what Reaper is capable of. We have to convince him another way.”

 

“But we have to get into the compound first,” Amélie said. “If he’s as smart as his file says he is, he will not be easy to get to.”

 

Gabriel sighed. “If we run into any extreme traps, I could wraith through and dismantle them from the other side. It will cost me, though, so you’ll have to be on your guard.”

 

“We’d rather you not need to do that, but we’ll add it as a worst-case option,” Olivia said.

 

They discussed plans well into the night, and by eight the next morning they were on a transport to Spain. Gabriel refused to look back.

 

\-----

 

Olivia tracked Augustin down to a synagogue in Córdoba, near the southwestern corner of Spain. The sun hadn’t yet risen when they arrived, and Amélie guided them out of the narrow streets, through a small arch in the stone wall, and onto a wide walkway along the river. They had changed into more inconspicuous clothing, abandoning their uniforms for the last time in favor of items more their own.

 

_(“I fixed this for you,” Amélie said, handing over a bundle of fabric. Gabriel unfolded it cautiously, then found his vision suddenly blurry at the embroidered Blackwatch insignias decorating the black hoodie and beanie. “I used to embroider the insignia on Gérard’s things as a joke. It appears that I haven’t lost the skill.”)_

 

Olivia had covered up her distinctive hair and cybernetics with an intricately braided black wig, though she still wore purple from head to toe, while Amélie had tied her hair up in a truly impressive bun and donned jeans and a simple top. Gabriel’s new beanie and hoodie covered up a good deal of the damage done to his body, and a pair of aviators were large enough to hide the exposed bone. They taken care to break down and hide their weapons in their satchels, but not before allowing Olivia to carefully transfer their trackers to little mechanical bugs.

 

They finally stopped on the banks of the Guadalquivir. One by one, they deftly hopped over the wall and picked their way to the water’s edge, the trees hiding them from view. Olivia pulled out her tracker, Amélie and Gabriel following suit.

 

“The current is just strong enough that these will be far away by the time they ping them again,” she said. “It will look like normal movement unless they look closely.”

 

“They’ll look,” Gabriel said grimly. “Amie and I are their prized science experiments.”

 

“Stop that.” Olivia hefted her tracker. “Ready? On three. One…two…three!” They flung the bugs as far downriver as they could, taking great satisfaction as the glint of metal was swept away from them.

 

Amélie bit her lip. “How long do we have?”

 

“The clock started when we got off the transport,” Olivia said. “We have forty-six hours to find Augustin, get him on our side, and possibly establish communications with Overwatch.”

 

“That is not enough time.”

 

“We’re going to have to make it enough,” Gabriel said. He turned and began the hike back to the sidewalk. “C’mon. We’ve got a medic to persuade not to kill us.”

 

\-----

 

There were no traps. Augustin set up no cameras, had no defense systems, and didn’t even lock the door. It was an open invitation to see him, and they followed the rabbi down the hallway to where he was staying.

 

 _“Gracias rabino,”_ Gabriel said.

 

The rabbi just smiled and waved them in. _“Él hará todo lo posible para ayudarte. Tal vez algún día no vayas a fumar en mi pasillo.”_

 

Gabriel looked down and realized he’d lost his left arm. Sheepishly, he regathered it and followed his companions inside with one last _gracias._

 

Augustin was waiting for them in full armor with his loaded gun sitting across his lap. He looked up at Amélie, something like resignation in his eyes. “Are you here to kill me, _Mademoiselle_ Widowmaker?” he asked quietly. “Perhaps it was foolish of me, but I didn’t think it would come to this.”

 

“No, we are not here for that.” Amélie removed her satchel, unzipped it to show him her weapon, and gently tossed the bag at his feet before gesturing for Gabriel and Sombra to do the same. “We are here to ask for your help.”

 

“My help?” Augustin set his gun aside, but still pushed their weapons further behind him, well out of their reach. “What need do you have of me?”

 

“I believe this will be a mutually beneficial relationship,” she said. In a moment of uncertainty, she bit her lip, but continued. “My name is Amélie Lacroix, and I was kidnapped by Talon eight years ago and medically improved into an agent. To my left is my partner, Olivia Colomar, though she is better known as Sombra, and to my right is Reaper.”

 

Augustin’s eyes laser-focused onto Gabriel, and he forced himself to remain passive as he removed his sunglasses. “My real name is Gabriel Reyes,” he said. “I’m sure you realized that Talon prefers to keep their people dependent on them.”

 

“Gabriel Reyes is dead,” Augustin said.”

 

Gabriel smirked humorlessly. “Didn’t take.”

 

“We are going to try and make contact with the reformed Overwatch,” Amélie continued. “However, in the interim, Gabriel and I are both medically unstable and require treatment from someone who isn’t also manipulating our genetic codes. In exchange, we will protect you from Talon and vouch for you if and when Overwatch comes for us.”

 

“I see.” The medic cocked his head at her, evaluating the offer. “I treat you two, you protect me and get me in with the good guys?”

 

Amélie smiled, sweet and genuine. _“Oui.”_

 

“Seems fair enough.” He held out a hand and Amélie shook it. “Call me Baptiste. It is a pleasure to meet you three, Mrs. Lacroix, Ms. Colomar, Commander Reyes.”

 

“First names are fine, son,” Gabriel said, finally relaxing. “Amélie’s real good at talking fancy, but we’re casual people here.”

 

“Understood,” Baptiste said with a grin. “Now, if you wouldn’t mind, I would like to make my first order of business the gaping hole in your face.”

 

“Be my guest.”

 

“One question, though.” He turned to Olivia. “How long do we have before Talon comes looking?”

 

She winced. “Forty-three hours.”

 

“And Overwatch?”

 

“Unknown.”

 

He sighed. “Great. Come on then, Gabriel. Let’s make you look pretty.”

 

\-----

 

At 5:00 AM CET, twenty-three hours after the mission began and twenty-five hours before the agreed-upon time, Akande Ogundimu pinged the trackers of his three most prized agents. From the first, he received no coordinates and a cartoon drawing of male anatomy. From the second, he again received no coordinates and a cartoon dick. When he opened the third, there were still no coordinates, but there was a message.

 

_People aren’t pets. People aren’t experiments. People aren’t weapons. People aren’t data or collectibles or prizes to be won._

_Fuck off._

_With love, The Sombra Collective_

_P.S. Our contract is over, effective immediately xoxo_

 

Ogundimu slammed a fist into his desk, breaking it cleanly in half. He activated his intercom. “All elite agents, suit up and go to the loading dock.” He grinned, cruel and cold. “We’re going to Spain.”

\-----

 

At 6:00 AM CET, Jesse McCree was woken up by the insistent beeping of his private comm line. There was a video message. Groggily, he opened it, squinting at the bright screen with sleep-fogged eyes. To his shock, up popped the worn and wan face of Sombra, sitting on a cot with Widowmaker crumpled in her lap.

 

 _“Jesse,”_ she said, her voice cracking with exhaustion, _“it’s Olivia. I have Gabriel Reyes and Amélie Lacroix with me, but they are both incapacitated and we need help. We’ve deserted Talon alongside a medic, but we were tailed despite switching locations multiple times. Amélie isn’t responding after her second treatment and Baptiste is concerned that she-”_ She cut herself off with a ragged breath. _“Please, we need your help. Our coordinates are attached to this message – you’ll receive them once it is over. Please, I will do anything you need, answer whatever questions you ask, but we are running out of time.”_ An explosion rung out and Sombra flinched. _“We’re in Córdoba, Spain. Colomar out.”_

 

Suddenly wide awake, Jesse shot out of bed, nearly taking out his sleeping partner. He started grabbing his clothes from where they were strewn across the floor and shoving them on.

 

Hanzo sat up, rubbing his side where he’d been kneed. “Jesse, what the hell are you doing?”

 

“We gotta go,” Jesse panted, flinging a shirt and trousers at him. “Papí’s in trouble.”

 

Without another question, the archer began to dress. “Did you call the others?”

 

“Shit. Athena!”

 

“Yes, Agent McCree?”

 

“Send out an urgent mission summons to everyone in the compound,” he instructed. “Tell them that Commander Reyes, Amélie Lacroix, Olivia Colomar, and an ally of theirs are in danger and need immediate extraction. You have permission to retrieve their coordinates from my comm.”

 

“Understood. Receiving coordinates now.”

 

Jesse let out a sigh of relief as he heard the summons echo through the halls, followed by the sounds of the base leaping into action. “We’re comin’, Liv,” he said, shoving Peacekeeper in his holster. “Hang in there.”

 

\-----

 

The building shuddered again, and Olivia clutched Amélie close to her chest as Gabriel groaned from the cot across the room. He cracked one eye open, seeking her out through his fevered haze.

 

“I’m sorry,” he croaked, “I should’ve been more careful.” He coughed, and when he pulled his arm away from his mouth it was dotted with blood. Baptiste shushed him and wiped him down with a cool cloth.

 

Olivia nearly wept. “They’re coming, Papá, just hang on,” she said, trying to keep the desperation out of her voice. “They’ll be here soon.”

 

“Jackie…”

 

Baptiste clucked his tongue. “Hush, Gabriel, you’ll make it worse.” But Gabriel had already fallen back into unconsciousness. “Are you sure Overwatch is coming?”  he asked.

 

“I’m not sure of anything anymore,” Olivia said honestly, “but I know Jesse McCree, and if he doesn’t come through, then no one will.”

 

“I fail to see how that is reassuring.”

 

“It sounded better in my head.”

 

_Boom!_

 

 _Come on, Jesse,_ she prayed as she ran her fingers through the smooth length of Amélie’s hair. _Don’t you dare fail me now._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Translations:**  
>  Gracias rabino - Thank you rabbi  
> Él hará todo lo posible para ayudarte. - He will do his best to help you.  
> Tal vez algún día no vayas a fumar en mi pasillo. - Maybe one day you won't smoke up my hallway. 
> 
> **Writing Notes:**  
>  1) Gabriel is very good at Angst. If you guessed that Olivia and Amélie have been dealing with this non-stop from him since the end of the previous chapter, then _ding ding_ you would be right!  
> 2) You can't look at Jack and not think "Captain America." I had to get the joke in there somehow.  
> 3) There is no way that Amélie's slowed-down heart isn't killing her. She's fucking _purple_.  
> 4) All three of them are terrified, and in this moment Baptiste looks like an old god holding out the hand of redemption, especially for Amélie.  
> 5) No matter how capable a person may be, the tendency when frightened is to look to a parental figure for help. In this case it's Gabriel, who is so over being in charge at this point.  
> 6) This city is so beautiful. I'm literally begging you to go and look it up on Google maps and take a "stroll."  
> 7) The best thing Amélie ever put a Blackwatch insignia onto was the trellis outside her and Gérard's bedroom window. It took her the entire five weeks of the mission he was on to complete, and she still pulled a couple of all-nighters before he came home. It stayed there until his death and her recapture, at which point it was relocated to the closest Watchpoint.  
> 8) Amélie takes the lead on this one as she not only has the best manners, but she and Baptiste share a language - the official languages of Haiti are French and Haitian Creole, and given his background and career path, he likely speaks both.  
> 9) The "didn't take" Reaper voiceline is one of my absolute favorites. It had to go in here somewhere.  
> 10) Even the smartest people can be outsmarted sometimes. Olivia is not infallible, and Doomfist is not trustworthy.  
> 11) Olivia, when she sent that message, likely hadn't slept at all since the mission briefing, which was two days ago at this point. She is exhausted, she is desperate, and she is scared.  
> 12) Baptiste is an incredibly capable medic, but he is not a miracle worker. He is also working on minimal supplies, which is part of the reason why they left the synagogue to go somewhere else. In his charge are two very medically at-risk people who are suddenly suffering from withdrawal from whatever Moira was pumping into them and he has no access to any of their records, so he is trusting his instincts and doing what he does best. 
> 
> See you in the next and final chapter!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here it is: the final part! Welcome! 
> 
> This starts, of course, immediately after the end of the previous chapter. 
> 
> Enjoy!

The doors of the ORCAs opened to a scene of utter chaos. Jack charged out after Genji, while Angela, Jesse, Brigitte, and Aleks were hot on his heels. They had rapidly divvied up on the short flight, deciding on one extraction team and two distraction teams, the former fetching the quartet trapped behind Talon’s lines while the latter diverted their attention. There wasn’t much damage to the city itself; Talon seemed to be focusing on the old Moorish cathedral, filling the narrow walkways surrounding it with foot soldiers rather than sending in cannons and gunships.

 

“They want ‘em alive,” Jesse said, taking cover behind a tree as a small groups of Talon ops rushed past them. “The booms in the recordin’ were prolly them tryin’ to break down the door.”

 

“You think they managed?” Jack asked. Another boom rang through between the walls.

 

Jesse shrugged. “Guess not.”

 

They sprinted the rest of the way to the cathedral, letting Genji lead them around the back to the passage Olivia had indicated. Aleks easily busted the door down, and the group hurried inside.

 

“Jesse, can you hail them at all?” Angela asked.

 

“I can try.” Jesse punched something on his arm. “Olivia, come in!” He waited a moment before trying again. “Olivia Colomar, come in!” Still there was silence. He shook his head. “I don’t think she-”

 

“Stop right there!”

 

They skidded to a halt, Brigitte taking a defensive position with her shield as the rest fell in behind her. In front of them was a group of Talon ops, helmets firmly in place and weapons aimed directly at them.

 

“State your business!” ordered the one in front.

 

“Came for early communion,” Jesse drawled. “Unfortunately, y’all had the front door blocked off, so we came in the side door.”

 

They were unimpressed with his answer. The op cocked their gun, but before they could open fire, a small object clattered down to the floor between the groups. “What the-”

 

A figure materialized in a flicker of purple. _“¡Hola!”_ Olivia greeted with a cheery wave.

 

“Take her out!” the head op screamed, but Jack and Jesse were faster. They opened fire, Olivia ducking just in time, and the fight was over before it truly began.

 

Jesse shoved past Brigitte and dropped to the floor beside his friend, grabbing her shoulder in a panic. “Livy! You okay?”

 

She blinked, then threw herself at him in a hug. “ _Dios mío,_ I wasn’t sure you’d make it-”

 

“Hey, now,” he soothed, standing and pulling her up with him as Angela darted forward to join them, “you know I always keep my promises. That was a pretty dramatic entrance you had there.”

 

“Thank you, I’ve been practicing.” She sighed in relief when Angela slapped a biotic patch on her arm. “I needed that.”

 

“It certainly looks like it,” Angela said with a tight smile. “Can you take us to the others?”

 

Olivia nodded, then pointed down an adjoining hallway. “Down here and two stories up. They’ll probably need carried.” She looked over the group again. “Oh. You have the Russian woman. You’ll be fine.”

 

“Nice to be on the same side this time, yes?” Aleks said, grinning.

 

“Always nice to see friends,” Olivia said. “Come on!”

 

They pounded up the stairs, following the hacker to a plain door in the middle of the building. She knocked in the door in a sequence and it swung open to reveal a tall, dark-skinned man in scratched armor.

 

“Is this them?” he asked. At her nod, he stepped back and allowed them entry.

 

“This is Baptiste,” she said, leading them down the narrow hall in what was likely some sort of dormitory. “He deserted first and we followed him.”

 

“A pleasure.”

 

“Pleasure’s ours,” Jesse said genuinely. “Thank you. Overwatch could use you, if you wouldn’t mind leavin’ one illegal organization to join another.”

 

“I’ve never been one for convention,” Baptiste said. “The others have spoken very highly of you.” He opened another door, revealing a medium-sized, sparsely decorated room. There were three cots, but only two were occupied.

 

Jack’s entire world narrowed down to the flushed face on the cot in front of him. He stumbled over to it and dropped to his knees, distantly aware of Brigitte behind him opening up her medkit. “Gabe!” he said, grasping his husband’s hand. “Gabe, it’s me, it’s Jackie, come on-”

 

Hazy green eyes opened, slowly focusing on him. “Jackie?” Gabriel rasped. “That really you?”

 

“It’s me, baby, you’re not hallucinating, I promise.” Gabe’s other hand came up to tug weakly at his visor, and Jack ripped it down to his neck, ignoring the pain as it caught on his scars. “See? It’s me!”

 

“I missed those big baby blues,” Gabe murmured, running a shaky thumb over his cheekbone. “Sorry for shooting you.”

 

“Eh, it’s okay. Wouldn’t be the first time.”

 

Brigitte pulled off her gloved and prepared a vaccine. “This is a booster,” she told Jack, “it’ll get him up long enough for extraction.”

 

“Do it,” he said.

 

Gabe blinked up at her as she disinfected his arm. “Damn, is that Brigitte?”

 

“Hi, Uncle Gabe!” she said, smiling brightly.

 

“Where’d you get armor?”

 

“I made it. Do you like it?”

 

He snorted. “You look great. Your dad hates it?”

 

“More than anything,” she agreed. She gave him the shot, and the effect was instantaneous.

 

“Holy shit!” he said, sitting up with a gasp. “What was in that thing?”

 

“Adrenaline, a healthy dose of penicillin, and some anabolic steroids,” she said. “Stay away from professional sports for a while, okay?”

 

“You’ve got it.” He was still warm to the touch, but the cloudiness was gone from his eyes and he seemed more alert. “Got anything to deal with the rest of me?”

 

“Any guess as to how you’d react to biotics?”

 

“He should be fine,” Baptiste called from where he and Angela were hunched over Amélie. “I was able to stabilize his nanites. He reacted poorly to the immune booster.”

 

“Of course you’d get sick from something to stop you from getting sick,” Brigitte grumbled. She pulled out two biotic patches and slapped them on either side of his throat. “There. That might actually take care of it, if we’re lucky.” Satisfied, she went to join the medics at the other cot.

 

Jack helped Gabriel up from the tiny cot. “I missed you so fucking much,” he said, burying his face into his husband’s sweaty shoulder. “I love you.”

 

“I love you, too.” Gabe pulled him into a kiss, laughing into it when a chorus of wolf-whistles sounded from behind them. They broke apart when Jack snorted. “Who all’s here?”

 

Jesse stepped forward and yanked him into a hug. “Hey there, pops.”

 

“Ah, _hola mijo,”_ Gabriel said. He relaxed into it, holding Jesse close. _"¿Cómo estás?”_

 

A chuckle that sounded more like a sob came from Jesse’s throat. _“Estoy bien,”_ he said, _“estoy muy bien.”_

 

“Lemme look at you.” Gabriel pulled back and scanned him up and down. “Much more colorful, I like it.”

 

“D’aww, thanks. Not all of us can pull off eternal emo.”

 

Genji darted over then, hovering uncertainly on Jack’s left. Gabriel, psychic that he was when it came to his children, noticed immediately.

 

“Jesus, Genji! Look at all that green!” he teased. “I could see you from a mile away!” He crushed the young man in a bear hug, just the way he’d done before. “How’re you doin’, little sparrow?”

 

“I’m doing great,” Genji said. “I have people for you to meet. Jesse, too. We actually share a person, so I guess you only have to meet two people, but I really hope you like them-”

 

“You’re rambling, sweetheart,” Jack said, smiling fondly. Genji’s jaw shut with a metallic _click._

 

“Amélie is stable and we’re ready to go,” Angela announced. Jack glanced over to see the former ballerina strapped like a baby to Aleks’s front, Olivia hovering nervously nearby. “Let’s be quick, please! Winston says we have a window if we get there in five minutes.”

 

“Move out!” Jesse barked, and the group began their frantic race back to the ORCAs.

 

\-----

 

Once it was clear that their targets had escaped, Talon retreated to lick its wounds. The attack itself was blamed rightfully on Talon, one of the few to be definitively identified and called out publicly due to the clear insignias on armor and transports. News outlets referred to Overwatch’s distraction teams as “brave heroes” and “reckless vigilantes” in equal measure, and every broadcaster avoided the word _Overwatch_ like it was the plague.

 

Jack watched it all happen from the chair beside his husband’s hospital bed. Angela had banned Gabriel from leaving until all of the tests she’d run on his nanites came back green-lit, so Jack didn’t leave either, taking all of his meals and sleeping in the medical bay. Olivia had done the same, and when their respective partners were sleeping, the two sat and got to know each other through the people they had in common, swapping anecdotes and tissues long into the night.

 

Amélie, through some miracle, had woken on the flight back to Gibraltar. Angela and Lúcio theorized that her body had required a reset as it began the adjustment back to human standards, as her heart rate and body temperature began to increase. She would never be _normal_ , Angela said, but she would at least regulate enough that her skin would return to its original shade. Until then, she would sleep frequently and eat like a starving horse. _(Thank god Reinhardt cooks enough to feed a small army,_ Hana joked.)

 

Gabriel ran a hand over his curls, grimacing into his hand mirror. “Maybe I should shave it off again,” he said. “No one in my family went grey until their seventies.”

 

“Don’t,” Jack said. “It makes you look distinguished. Besides, then I’d feel pressured to shave off all my hair, and we both know I look hideous bald.”

 

 _“Dios mío,”_ Gabriel groaned, “that was the worst decision you ever made.”

 

“I was sixteen and had no choice.”

 

“Still.”

 

There was a knock on the door, shortly followed by Angela’s head. “Bickering again?” she asked, smiling fondly.

 

“When do we do anything but?” Gabriel held out his arms for a hug. “C’mere, Angie. You look tired, when did you last sleep?”

 

Angela laughed as she submitted to the affection. “You’re worse than my wife!”

 

“I’m your dad. It’s in the contract they give you when you get a new kid, right Jack?”

 

“That’s right,” Jack said. “We signed it in purple sparkly gel pen.”

 

“You two are ridiculous,” she huffed, but she was smiling. “I have good news. All of your tests are clear, so you can leave!”

 

“Yay!” Gabe cheered. “What’s the catch?”

 

“You have to come back once a week for a check-up for the next three months,” Angela said. “Also, no missions until the end of that period. Understand?”

 

Gabriel sighed, but nodded. “Loud and clear, doc.”

 

“Excellent.” She hugged him again, sinking into it looking more vulnerable than she had since the extraction mission. “I missed you.”

 

“I missed you too, kid. None of this was your fault, you know that?”

 

“I’m learning,” she said, “slowly, but I’m learning.”

 

“Cool.” He gave her one last, firm squeeze before letting her go and climbing out of bed. “Now if you’ll excuse me, your daddies dearest have rooms to re-christen.”

 

Angela made a very un-ladylike snort and turned on her heel. “At least you had the decency to wait until you were out of the med bay. I caught Lena and Emily _twice_.” She waved goodbye and shut the door behind her.

 

Jack gave Gabriel a very guilty look. “We should take these sheets with us.”

 

“Yeah…” Gabe tugged at the top sheet. “I mean, we’re really saving her effort on her part…”

 

“Just get dressed.” Jack leaned forward and kissed his husband, slow and sweet. “I’ll take these to the laundry and meet you in our room in an hour. Sound good?”

 

Gabriel grinned like the Cheshire Cat. “That sounds perfect.”

 

-fin.-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Translations:**  
>  Hola - hello  
> Dios mío - my god  
> mijo - son  
> ¿Cómo estás? - How are you?  
> Estoy bien, estoy muy bien. -I'm good, I'm very good. 
> 
> **Writing Notes:**  
>  1) To clarify the extraction team comp, there are two healers (Angela and Brigitte), two shields (Zarya/Aleks and Brigitte again), and three damage (Jack, Jesse, and Genji), so essentially it's your standard in-game attack team.  
> 2) Talon wants Amélie and Gabriel alive. They could care less about Baptiste and Olivia.  
> 3) Aleks is nothing if not a good sport. I love her.  
> 4) Jack's too polite to think it, but Olivia looks _terrible_. Reminder from the last chapter: she hasn't slept in two, maybe three days.  
> 5) Baptiste is doing his absolute best not to freak out that Dr. Angela Ziegler is _right there, holy shit-_  
>  6) Jack is referring to a particularly vicious game of paintball, during which Gabriel shot him in the dick.  
> 7) I AM NOT A DOCTOR. YOU PROBABLY SHOULDN'T INJECT THAT STUFF INTO YOUR BODY LIKE THAT.  
> 8) For both of them, the remnants of Moira's stuff is going "wait no we don't like that" to what Baptiste is doing and trying to put things back to the twisted version of "normal" she created for them.  
> 9) As mentioned in TL;TF, Brigitte looks at Ana, Jack, and Gabe as her aunt and uncles and addresses them as such.  
> 10) Genji is super nervous about introducing his "dad" to his husband. It's kind of adorable, really.  
> 11) I LOVE the fanart of older Gabe with greying curly hair. He looks happier to me for some reason.  
> 12) I'm nearly 22 and my parents still bring up the "parent contract" they allegedly signed in the hospital.  
> 13) _Oh yes they did._  
>  14) Look, it is a happy ending. I told the truth. You're welcome. 
> 
> I'm rina-san28 on Tumblr! Come say hi and have a chat!


End file.
